Mother upset after stillborn incident

Henrietta Turner.

A "very upsetting" incident took place at Waikato Hospital during a stillborn baby's birth, Waikato District Health Board has confirmed.

The mother, Henrietta Turner, has spoken out about the damage her stillborn child suffered during a failed forceps delivery and has made an official complaint.

The clinical director of obstetrics, Dr Penelope Makepeace, acknowledged the mother "experienced a very upsetting incident around the birth of her child", but did not provide further details about that case.

Fairfax reported that Ms Turner was 38 weeks pregnant with her second child, Johnny, when she was told last month that he had died.

Hospital staff insisted she deliver Johnny, rather than have a caesarean section, to help with the grieving process.

However, the forceps process failed and she was taken into surgery, from which she woke to find her stillborn baby had suffered severe trauma, Fairfax reported.

Dr Makepeace said that when a baby died in the womb, changes appeared within one to two hours. Their bodies broke down and they became fragile.

In the case of still births, doctors encouraged women to deliver babies naturally because of risks involved in caesarean sections, Dr Makepeace said.

For a woman who had previously had a caesarean section, there was an increased risk of the placenta growing into the caesarean scar. This would cause complications for the woman's next pregnancy.

Dr Makepeace would not directly comment on Ms Turner's case but said hospital staff had met her and her family to answer queries.

"We are reviewing this case to see if there are things we could have done differently and will keep the mother and her family informed and involved throughout the process.

"We know they are going through a lot of pain at this distressing time and we sympathise with their loss. We would like to extend our condolences to this mother and her family," she said.

About 3500 babies are born at Waikato Hospital each year.

In New Zealand, one in every 100 babies dies before birth or within 28 days after. About half of these are stillbirths.